It was announced by the American Academy of Arts and Letters earlier today that the composer Mario Davidovsky has died. Davidovsky, who was born in Argentina, studied with Aaron Copland and Milton Babbitt. He was a former member of the composition faculty at Columbia University and a past director of the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center.

Davidovsky emigrated to the United States in 1960. His work, “Synchronisms No. 6,” for piano and electroacoustic sounds played from tape, was honored with the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1971. At the time of his death, on Friday, Davidovsky was 85 years-old.

Synchronisms No. 6:

PHOTO (left to right): CPEMC personnel Milton Babbitt, Mario Davidovsky, Pril Smiley, Vladimir Ussachevsky, Otto Luening, and Alice Shields, circa 1970